Healthcare use by veterans treated for diabetes mellitus in the Veterans Affairs medical care system.

Objectives: To estimate the burden of comorbid conditions and to describe patterns of inpatient and outpatient service use by veterans with diabetes mellitus.

Study Design: Retrospective cohort study of 33,481 veterans conducted by means of secondary analysis of Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) healthcare utilization databases.

Patients And Methods: The cohort was constructed by enrolling all veterans treated in the VA medical care system who had their initial VA hospitalization for diabetes mellitus between 1992 and 1997.

Mycobacterium simiae pseudo-outbreak resulting from a contaminated hospital water supply in Houston, Texas.

Various species of nontuberculous mycobacteria are known to cause nosocomial pseudo-outbreaks, but there have been no detailed reports of nosocomial Mycobacterium simiae pseudo-outbreaks. From April 1997 through February 2001, we recovered 65 M. simiae isolates from 62 patients at a community teaching hospital in Houston, Texas.